was willing to consider as an alternative candidate for the see of St David’s in 1199
because ‘he has often visited Wales and dwells upon her borders’-—as well as Peter
de Leche, archdeacon of Worcester.63
However, Giraldus’s closest English connections were with two cathedral churches:
Hereford and Lincoln. He appears to have spent about two years at Hereford follow¬
ing his retirement from the court in 1194 and praised it in a poem as a place of peace
and learning:64 he held a canonry there, benefiting from the patronage of Bishop
William de Vere, who sought to attract scholars to his episcopal see and who proba¬
bly commissioned Giraldus to write a revised Life of the church’s patron saint,
Ethelbert.65 Giraldus donated copies of his two books on Ireland and a version of his
Speculum Ecclesie to the cathedral library and was on friendly terms with a number
of the canons, especially the scholar and poet Simon de Freine, who wrote two
poems to him.66 But it was to Lincoln that Giraldus went c. 1196 to continue his
theological studies when he was unable to travel to Pans again on account of the
renewal of hostilities between Philip Augustus and Richard I, and it was to Lincoln
that he retired c. 1208.67 With its extensive library—to which Giraldus donated
several volumes—and the company of other scholars, notably William de Montibus,
Lincoln provided a congenial environment for Giraldus and it was there that he wrote
many of his later works, including a Life of the see’s first Norman bishop, Remigius
(1067-92), in support of an unsuccessful attempt to secure his canonization, as well
as of Bishop Hugh (1186-1200), canonized in 1220.68
63 Giraldus, Opera 1 pp. 306-7; translations from Butler (as n. 22) pp. 145-6. Giraldus had
other links with Worcester through Baldwin, who had been bishop of the see (1180-4)
before his translation to Canterbury: cf. Lloyd (as n. 3) 2 p. 561 and n. 132. Note also that
Giraldus’s Vita S. Remigii included an account of Roger, bishop of Worcester: Giraldus,
Opera 7 pp. 62-7.
64 Ibid. 1 pp. 378-80.
65 Dorothy Humphreys, Some Types of Social Life as Shown in the Works of Gerald of
Wales, unpublished Oxford University B.Litt. thesis, Oxford 1936, pp. 139-96; Julia
Barrow, A Twelfth-Century Bishop and Literary Patron: William de Vere, in: Viator 18
(1987) pp. 184-6. Another canon of St David’s, Reginald Foliot, was also a member of
Bishop William’s household: ibid. p. 1 84.
66 Giraldus, Opera 1 pp. 382-4, 409. See also ibid. pp. 249, 268-71, 334-5; Lefèvre et al.,
Speculum Duorum (as n. 20) pp. 157-67; and cf. R. W. Hunt, English Learning in the Late
Twelfth Century, in: R. W. Southern (ed.), Essays in Medieval History, London 1968, pp.
121-2.
6' Giraldus, Opera 1 p. 93; Richard M. Loomis (ed.), Gerald of Wales (Giraldus Cambrensis):
The Life of St. Hugh of Avalon, Bishop of Lincoln 1186-1200, New York/London 1985,
pp. xv-xviii.
68 Humphreys (as n. 65) pp. 197-232; H. Mackinnon, William de Montibus: A Medieval
Teacher, in: T. A. Sandquist and M. R. Powicke (eds.), Essays in Medieval History Presen¬
ted to Bertie Wilkinson, Toronto 1969, pp. 32-45; Loomis, Life of St. Hugh (as n. 67);
David M. Smith (ed.), English Episcopal Acta I: Lincoln 1067-1185, London 1980, p
xxxi. Giraldus also held the living of Chesterton in the diocese from c. 1190: Davies,
Giraldus (as n. 11 ) p. 89 n. 12.
56